Sunday 19 May 2019

And For Those Who Would Like To Know

Perhaps Donald Trump really has had a change of heart about abortion. He must have been responsible for enough abortions in his time, but hope springs eternal. However, his use of the infamous "rape'n'incest" exemption indicates that he still has no connection to the pro-life movement, nor any familiarity with its arguments.

Moreover, "to save the life of the mother" depends on the principle of double effect, whereby the intended effect must be to save the mother's life, not to terminate the pregnancy, but the effect of not performing the procedure would be greater evil of the deaths of both the mother and the child. Of course, in the United States or the United Kingdom in the present day, such situations are mercifully rare almost to the point of being academic.

As for Ronald Reagan, how does that one still do the rounds? Nothing in Reagan's record ever suggested the slightest shift in his position after he had legalised abortion in California. On the contrary, as President, he nominated no fewer than three supporters of abortion to the Supreme Court.

This has not won Trump the vote of anyone who would not have voted for him anyway, having already done so once before. After all, for whom might they otherwise have voted? Joe Biden? Bernie Sanders? Well, there you are, then.

In any case, abortion has not been a major electoral issue in the United States this century, if it ever really was. It has never stopped people from campaigning and voting for Reagan, for the Bushes, for Bob Dole, for John McCain, for Mitt Romney (who had not only legalised public funding of abortion in Massachusetts, but who derived an income from that funding), or for Trump.

In the same way, Nigel Farage is in favour of drug legalisation, and he was in favour of same-sex marriage before either main party came to be so, just as Trump was before Barack Obama or the Clintons. Vote for the Brexit Party on Thursday. But it offers no hope to social conservatives when it comes to voting for the House of Commons. It already contains both Thatcherite and Trotskyist libertarians, which as much as anything else means supporters of absolutely no immigration controls whatever. Tellingly, the fiercely anti-immigration rump of UKIP is going to be wiped off the map, so think on that.

There is no doubt at all that the two largest parties in the next Parliament will be Labour and the Conservatives, probably in that order, but certainly as good as evenly matched. Five years on again, and any "Brexit realignment" moment will be long gone. I have been hearing about supposedly imminent realignments of British politics for as long as I can remember. But however badly the two main parties did at the recent local elections, they still did a lot better than anyone else.

Another hung Parliament is coming, however, and we need our people to hold the balance of power in it. It has become a local commonplace that I am on 30-30-30 with Labour and the Conservatives here at North West Durham, so that any one of us could be the First Past the Post. I will stand for this seat, if I can raise the £10,000 necessary to mount a serious campaign. Please email davidaslindsay@hotmail.com. Very many thanks.

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